


Breathing 2: Learning to Believe

by sfmpco



Series: Breathing Lessons [2]
Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Birth, F/M, Parentlock
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-09
Updated: 2015-05-09
Packaged: 2018-03-29 17:00:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,205
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3903985
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sfmpco/pseuds/sfmpco
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sherlock and Molly at hospital as Molly gives birth to their first child.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Breathing 2: Learning to Believe

**Author's Note:**

> Okay, so I guess I'm taking 2 days off from working on my book. Just sort of had to get these one-shots out of me although this is a bit of a continuation of the other one.

Mr. and Mrs. Holmes had immediately set out from Devon for London upon receiving the text that Molly and Sherlock were on their way to hospital to deliver their first child. John and Mary Watson left home mid-morning after procuring child care and made their way to hospital. Molly’s mother, Pamela, made her way to hospital from the west side of London on the tube in rush hour crowds.

Mycroft asked to be informed when it was over and said he would stop by later in the day. He was not a man to pace waiting rooms in hospitals, but he did find himself unable to sit still in a morning meeting with his peers. He paced the room and stood at the window looking out at the gathering storm clouds. His mind was clearly not on the meeting, but he would never admit it. His world with Sherlock had shifted into unfamiliar territory, and all his precepts about his brilliant but unpredictable younger brother no longer seemed grounded. He was not certain what to think or believe anymore about Sherlock’s future and potential. The old glory days of the thrill of solving the puzzle seemed tempered by marriage and impending fatherhood, and both of these concepts were completely alien to Mycroft and always would be.

Despite Sherlock’s encouraging words, Molly had begun to panic as the contractions grew stronger. She was not certain she could do it, but she desperately wanted to be brave. When the anesthetist came and offered her an epidural she had hesitated. Long before they had arrived at that day, she had bravely declared to Sherlock that she did not want or need help with the pain. Women had done it for thousands of years without pain killers, and she wanted to join their ranks, but now she was not certain.

When she and Sherlock had arrived at hospital, she was already six centimeters dilated, but those last four centimeters were taking their own good time while the frequency of the contractions increased as did the pain level.

“There’s no shame in the epidural.” Sherlock gently assured her as he leaned down close to her hospital bed and stroked her hair back from her face. “You do what you need to do to help your body, and I’ll support whatever decision you make.”

He glanced up at the fetal heart rate monitor. Every time she began to panic, the baby’s heart rate also went up, and he had to find a way to calm her down. He pulled up a chair and continued to stroke her brow. “I always noticed you, even from the first time we met. I thought you were competent, and it was rather delightful to have a woman working in the morgue who understood my morbid sense of humor even if you did not share it.” He pressed the back of her hand to his lips. “You weren’t ever squeamish in the slightest, and that’s rare in my line of work. I actually entertained the idea of asking you to consult with me on cases.”

“You never told me that.” She said quietly.

“Might have entertained it for less than five seconds, but it did cross my mind.” He said. He offered her a smile and wink. “And that time in Bart’s canteen when I told you I liked the new way you parted your hair—“

“You were only trying to flatter me so that I would help you.” she interrupted.

“No, no.” he insisted. “Well, yes, but I actually did like it. It framed your face nicely.”

She began panting as a contraction started quickly and clenched her belly in a fierce grip. She groaned and gripped the side rail with one hand and his wrist with the other.

The baby’s heart rate went up as did hers. “Pant with me.” Sherlock said. “Remember what we were taught. They’ll help you focus. C’mon. Pant.’

She panted with him, but she suddenly cried out, “I have to push!” And she bore down, crying out with release from the effort after several seconds where she completely abandoned all the training they had been through.

Her doctor arrived moments later. “Let’s see how you’re progressing.” He said. He preformed the exam which of itself made her groan with discomfort, and said, “Eight centimeters. Two to go.”

She groaned at the thought, and Sherlock said, “She pushed on the last contraction.”

“No pushing. You’ll just wear yourself out, and we need you to keep your strength for the final part. When you get to ten, we’ll have you start pushing then, but not until.” He snapped off his gloves and dropped them into the medical waste bin. “I’ll be back in little bit to check on you, but in the meantime a walk up and down the hallway has been known to speed things along.”

Ultimately she decided against the epidural even though she was quite frightened of the whole natural childbirth phenomenon. Nothing at all felt natural at the moment, and she was beginning to feel it was highly over-rated.

Family and friends came in the room for brief visits, and that seemed to encourage her. She put on a brave countenance for them even during a few contractions, but Mary could see through it. Whatever Mary’s past, she had a strong sense of empathy, and she shooed Sherlock from the room. “I promised I wouldn’t leave her side!” he protested.

“Five minutes.” Mary insisted gently.

Molly assured him that it was all right with her that he left and as soon as he reluctantly departed, Mary sighed deeply and rolled her eyes.

Sherlock had kept his emotions completely in check while in the suite with her. He had been the perfect birth coach, perhaps too perfect. He followed the instructions from their class to the smallest detail. Those instructions helped him to focus on the task as well, but now he was thrust out and he didn’t know what his duty was any more. Molly had also warned him earlier that any rudeness to hospital staff would be automatic grounds for him being dismissed from her birthing suite, and he had had to bite his tongue more than once to control the urge. Damn fools. But now he stood in the hallway outside her suite and was overwhelmed. He looked down at his hands. He was trembling.

A hand on his shoulder startled him, and he found himself looking into the concerned eyes of John. “You all right?”

“Your wife just kicked me out for what I assume is a pep talk with my wife.”

“There are things only another woman can truly understand, and this is one of them.” John said. “It won’t be long now, I’m guessing.”

“This is not exactly happening like those films in birth class. Those women barely seemed to be struggling. Molly’s having a rough go of it.”

“Mary had a bit of a rough go at the end, but she’s one tough lady. So is Molly, and you’re doing great, mate. Just remember to agree with whatever she wants or says. Hormones are through the ceiling at the moment.” John smiled at him and Sherlock managed a little smile.

Although there was plenty of room and seating for several guests in her birthing suite, Molly had asked that only Sherlock and the medical staff be present for the birth, and the closer she came to birth, the more she knew her decision had been right. It was hard enough to focus on the instructions from Sherlock and her doctor, and she did not want or need the voices of anyone else crowding her thoughts. She felt it was a private moment and did not want to share it, and Sherlock agreed. It was their private moment.

Sherlock took up his position by her side again and gave her his hand as he went back to stroking her brow. She looked exhausted and yet suddenly seemed a little calmer after her talk with Mary. The calm, however, was only a façade that quickly faded with the coming contractions. _Nine centimeters._ So close. She wanted to push and shouted that she was going to push that baby out regardless of what anyone said. She was done with the pains and she was done with being pregnant, and she was determined to finish it. But she could not force a body that was not ready.

Sherlock had nothing new to say to comfort her. He felt as if he’d said it all already and simply put his mind into a playback and began repeating himself.

 _Ten centimeters._ Suddenly the room got very busy with the medical staff and the doctor taking up his position at the end of the birthing bed and giving her orders on when to push and how long to push. She gasped her cries of pain between pushing and pains, and Sherlock between whispering the most soothing, gentle things to her and turning into the commander that he often had to be.

After several big pushes, the baby fully emerged into the doctor’s waiting hands, and he held up the squeaking infant for Sherlock and Molly to see.

It was right then that Sherlock experienced a shift in reality. A shift in science. A shift in his entire belief system. He was not a man who believed in miracles and yet there was something extraordinarily miraculous about his chromosomes and Molly’s chromosomes creating biological magic to produce such a perfect, tiny human being. Biology be damned. Evolution be damned. He had helped create a miracle. He had planted the seed and Molly had incubated the fusion of their genetics, and the wrinkled, red little infant that was laid on her chest was part of him.

His emotions betrayed him when his trembling hands cut the cord and tears spilled down his cheeks. The child was taken by the medical staff to be cleaned and weighed, and he turned back to Molly and bent close to her. “You are magnificent.” He said. He kissed her several times, and she reached up and put her arm around his neck and kept him close as they comforted each other in the joy of the event.

The afterbirth was delivered, and Sherlock even found that fascinating – that his child had only recently lived and been nourished entirely inside that environment inside his wife. It was another miracle. Surely this was not a product of evolution but by perfect design, and yet he did not believe in intelligent design behind the complexities of life. Yet the evidence to the opposite confronted him. He was instantly profoundly moved to reconsider all he knew about biological science. He did not have the answers, but he would start searching.

Molly was cleaned and resettled into the bed, the friends and family came in for a few brief minutes to see the new family unit, to take turns holding and kissing the swaddled, sleeping baby. Lots of pictures were taken. Happy grandparents, happy friends, bouquets of flowers and congratulatory Mylar balloons. And then it was time for everyone to leave, but Molly could not rest just yet even though she was so weary she could barely keep her eyes open. The lactation specialist came to see her to help her learn to nurse.

Another miracle, Sherlock thought: that her body would produce nourishment almost instantly after the child was born.  The baby fussed at her nipple, not quite ready to latch on. “Daddy loves Mummy’s breasts,” Sherlock tried to encourage. He took out his IPhone and picked out a Mozart violin sonata that he had often channeled to Molly’s belly before the birth, but he kept the volume low. There was nothing to muffle the sound now. The little eyes blinked in recognition, and latching on was attempted again, this time with moderate success. Nourishment began to flow and suckling began which made Molly groan with relief. Her breasts were full. She also used a breast pump to relieve the pressure and bottle some of the milk.

When Mycroft visited later, he found Molly asleep in her hospital bed and Sherlock asleep on the sofa, his tiny newborn sleeping in his hands cradled on his chest. Violin lullabies played softly through Sherlock’s Iphone. This was not a scene Mycroft thought he’d ever witness, nor had it been anything he had ever particularly wished for. However, he had always known that if it were between him or Sherlock to produce offspring, it would have always been Sherlock. He had just never expected it to actually happen, but here it was in front of him, and he would have to make adjustments in his own life. Although he had no particular interest in children, he nevertheless made a silent vow that nothing would ever happen to this one. He left just as quietly as he had entered without them knowing he was ever there.

Sherlock, the man who had murdered Charles Augustus Magnussen at point-blank range now used those same hands to cradle the most precious and valuable thing in the world. His life was turning around. He believed in something bigger than himself. He believed in a good future.


End file.
